Did this party of two have you slightly confused?
by Craploadsofawesomeness
Summary: Okay, so maybe she wasn't being completely honest when she told Lizzie she agreed with her observation that they didn't like each other. Maybe she's lowkey had a thing for her ever since they were kids. You know, in the way where you want to be around someone all the time, and like hearing them giggle, and kind of doodle their name on the last page of your notebooks in sixth grade.
1. Chapter 1

While Josie and Penelope were just starting their Happily Ever After, Hope's was still a long way off.

It would, however, start at prom. Or maybe it had started a long time ago, years, in fact, when she'd met the strangest twin sisters, and one of them had growled at her while the other extended her hand so that they could become friends. The one with the brown hair, the friendly one, had introduced herself as Josie, and her growly, blonde sister as Lizzie. Hope had accepted Josie's offer of friendship, and secretly decided that she'd end up making the blonde smile one way or another.

It's been difficult, but Hope thinks she's done pretty well up until now.

Lizzie stares at her, eyes wide and shocked, and doesn't look like she's ever going to look, let alone smile at Hope again.

Hope supposes the kiss might've had something to do with that fact.

Okay, so rewinding, she believes the entire evening was cursed. With like, the Goddess of Love or Beauty or Romance or whatever, because it was in the fucking air. It had started with Penelope, who had completely, absolutely lost her breath when she had seen Josie descending the stairs, and had lost her chill so hard Hope believed she'd never find it again.

"Cat got your tongue, Park?" she had nudged the girl, who was standing next to her, and Penelope had just elbowed her back, not once taking her eyes off Josie.

What a dum-dum, she'd thought, before she saw Lizzie following her sister, and promptly lost her own train of thought.

Lizzie looked like an angel. She'd been wearing a simple black dress, but it looked like it was made for her, enhancing her blonde hair that she'd tied up on the top of her head. Her eyes looked deep, and warm, and now she was looking right at her and what the fuck, why was she sounding like a Young Adult novel in her head?

"Jeez, Hope, rein it in, will you?" Landon teases her in a whisper.

"Shut up," she whispers back to him.

Lizzie, who had by now made her way to them, and had presumably heard the end of the conversation, frowned at her, confused.

"Oh, uh, nothing," she'd explained, the words feeling strange and thick and confused in her head "I, just, um…"

"Are you okay?" Lizzie had asked, her expression shifting to concern.

"Oh, I'm great," she finally managed "You, um, look nice."

The girl in front of her blushed, and damn it, Hope should've known back then.

"You kissed me!"

"Okay," Hope raises her right eyebrow and her index finger "I do believe you've got that wrong. You kissed me."

"Definitely not," Lizzie declares. Her cheeks are flushed, and her chest is heaving with deep breaths, and her lips still look swollen, and all Hope wants is to close the gap between them and kiss her again.

Not that she had kissed her the first time.

The details seem a little blurry right now, because her head is still full of Lizzie's shoulders, and her fruity-smelling hair, and her still dark eyes, and the taste of her lip gloss and damn it, tangent. The point is, she was pretty sure she wasn't the only one. They'd just reconvened in the girl's restroom to make sure their plan of Josie becoming Prom Queen was going according to plan and then the topic had shifted and somehow come to rest on their dresses. Hope had told her that the dress that she was wearing had been a gift from her father, and somehow her voice had cracked, remembering the way that Caroline and Alaric had taken so many photos of them, and realizing that her dad would probably have done the same, and then Lizzie's arms were around her, holding her tight.

"It's alright," Lizzie had murmured "It's okay. Let it out."

And then after a while, they'd separated and somehow kind of ended up with their arms still around each other, faces right up close. And then they'd just leaned in.

"Ha!" she cries out triumphantly "It was both of us. I remember now. You kissed me too."

"I most certainly did not," Lizzie protests, not meeting her eyes, but sounding highly affronted "And why do you sound so excited anyway? Aren't you dating Landon? Oh, my God, I enabled cheating; I am an asshole….."

"We're not dating!" she tells her, in the shrillest voice possible, then clears her throat "I mean, we're not dating. Landon and I are just….."

"You came with him to Prom!"

"Well, yeah, we're friends. He's my best friend. And my favourite ex. We're definitely not dating, if that's what you're thinking. Really not dating."

"Oh," Lizzie says, a little deflated "Either way, this is…..you know."

"What?"

"A bad idea, of course," she completes, and Hope ignores the strange twinge of disappointment in her chest.

She nods, slowly.

"I guess it would be awkward" she says.

And at the same time, Lizzie says "It's not like we like each other like that anyway".

There is a minute of complete silence, and then Hope steps back.

"Yeah," she says brightly "Agreed."

Okay, so maybe she wasn't being completely honest when she told Lizzie she agreed with her observation that they didn't like each other. Maybe she's lowkey had a thing for her ever since they were kids. You know, in the way where you want to be around someone all the time, and like hearing them giggle, and kind of doodle their name on the last page of your notebooks in sixth grade. She's dated people, she's liked people, Lizzie is just this girl she kind of always comes back to as her idea of the perfect person. But it's always been lowkey.

Well, up until now, that is.

Kissing her has kind of opened a door in her head that she cannot seem to close now, no matter how hard she drags it. In fact, she's broken off the doorknob, and now it seems like it won't ever be the same again. She keeps thinking of Lizzie all day, keeps staring at the back of her head in the classes they share (she now knows the girl has a habit of twirling a pen between her fingers when she's not writing notes, knows that she runs her hand through her hair at regular intervals to fluff it up to make it look good. She knows Lizzie doesn't need to). She keeps zoning out in the middle of conversations whenever Lizzie walks into a room, feels her eyes helplessly gravitate to her presence whenever they're near. It's so bad that Penelope's noticed.

"Oh my God," she says out loud at lunch where they're all sitting together, Josie on her lap, and the others sprawled out on their chairs. Lizzie is sitting next to her today, and she feels electricity every time the skin of her arm brushes against hers.

Damn it, it's so soft.

"What?" M.G asks, confused.

"Oh, nothing," Penelope tells him, giving Hope a meaningful look.

She frowns at her, confused, and Penelope shakes her head as though saying later. And as soon as they're all gone, Josie after leaning down to kiss her girlfriend, she leans forward on the table, and looks her right in the eye.

"You have a thing for Lizzie Saltzman."

"What, I, never, what, okay fine. How did you know?"

"It's super fucking obvious, that's how. You kept jumping about a feet into the air every time she so much as looked in your direction."

She groans, head in her hands "Oh, it's looks that bad, huh?"

"It's worse that when Josie and I were doing our little dance around each other."

"But now you guys are together," she points out, and she can't help her own wistful tone.

Penelope gives her a piercing look "Oh damn, you like her. Fuck, it was bad enough when I thought it was just a crush, but you have it bad for her. Bad enough for love poetry, and serenades and shit."

"I'm not as lame as you," she snarks.

"And yet, who out of us is with the girl they're madly in love with?"

"Penelope, it's," she starts, softly "It's never going to happen. She's one of my closest friends, and I can't lose her. Plus, she doesn't feel that way about me."

"So what, you're going to push it down, and forget all about it?" Penelope asks her, and she sounds genuinely sympathetic.

"I'm going to try," she shrugs, and means it.

Except, it's really hard to when she find herself making out with said girl a week later, in a broom closet on the third floor.

Again, she's not really clear on the details, but it involved them trying to sneak out of some class for a bunk with all their other friends, except, M.G, Josie, and Penelope sneak out of their class relatively easily, Landon just charms Mrs. Schneider with a smile, but she and Lizzie find themselves stuck on the third floor with no visible exit and teachers coming. So, she'd just grabbed Lizzie's hand and jumped into the closet.

After that, she'd just made some stupid joke about what had happened the last time they'd found themselves alone in a confined space, and after the awkward laughter, they'd just kind of melted together.

Which brings them to this very moment, where all Hope can think about is lips, and soft skin, and silky hair. Lizzie kisses with a focused intensity that takes Hope's breath away, presses her lips onto hers like she knows exactly what she's doing, and she's blown away by the entire thing. She's got Hope pressed against the door, and is kissing her like she never wants to stop.

Hope doesn't want her to.

But she does, eventually, leaning back, breathing hard "Wait, wait, what are we, oh God, what are we doing?"

Hope just stares at her, and thinks, lips, hair, skin.

"Would you stop staring at me like that?" Lizzie asks again, and this time there's a note of pleading in her voice.

Hope finally clears the muddle in her head, and looks right at her.

"I don't think I can," she says finally, and leans forward to kiss her again.

So that's a massive failure, but Hope doesn't think she minds very much.


	2. Chapter 2

No matter how hard they try not to make it one, it becomes a thing. A thing in bold. A thing in italics. A thing, period.

And Lizzie tries, she really does. Tries to avoid situations which might inevitably lead her to be alone with Hope Mikaelson, and yet, it seems that some higher power out there is hell-bent on her giving in to the intense gravity that brews between the both of them. She has no other word for it. It has to be gravity. The intense urge she feels every time Hope sits next to her, to hold her hand, to slide her fingers in between hers and just stay like that. Brush that one strand of hair behind her ear, and kiss her forehead. To put her arm around hers like Penelope does to Josie whenever they're around.

(They're so gross and sappy and disgusting, and yet, Lizzie wants that. She sees how Penelope's eyes follow Josie around the room, like they're helpless, how she and her sister seek each other out even when sitting far from each other, their hands reaching out, their feet playing footsie under the table.)

She doesn't understand why it has to be Hope Mikaelson, of all people. Why she's always had a thing for the idiot loner who prides herself on being the School Rebel and who walks around telling people she doesn't need anybody. Because Lizzie needs her. She likes her. She likes the way Hope is the only person other than Josie who knows how to deal with her when she's having an episode, when she feels like the entire world is caving in on her, and the only way she can reach out and breathe is to do _something. _She likes how Hope just gets her, and lets her be herself, but calls her out when she thinks she's doing something wrong. Maybe she's been harboring this tiny crush on the girl since a lot of years, but she's gotten used to it.

And ever since they've started this thing she just doesn't know anymore. It started the day of the Prom, when she'd seen Hope standing at the bottom of the stairs in that blue dress, and nearly tripped and fallen downstairs. And then they'd been in the bathroom, and Hope had been crying, and she had looked so pretty, even with her puffy eyes, and her trembling bottom lip, and Lizzie just couldn't help herself.

(She totally lied. She had kissed Hope first.)

Then they had made out in that closet because it was dark, and Lizzie had somehow, thought, hoped, stupidly that that one time wouldn't count, because it was just a proximity thing. But now, it's been about so many times that she's lost count. All she has to do is see Hope, and suddenly she's thinking about the next time she'll be kissing her. Keeps day-dreaming about her hands in class, about how she felt pressed up against her in the last confined space they crashed into each other in, how she tasted.

Kissing Hope, always feels like rebellion.

Here's the thing. She knows it's not meant to last. There's no way in hell this, whatever they're doing, hidden stares, hidden trysts in secret places is ever going to end well. The first reason is that there's absolutely no chance that Hope likes her. Hope has a thing for sweet, innocent boys with hearts of gold, and she is none of those. She's a mean, selfish, jerk who has never once thought of putting anyone except herself first and no one as pure and simply good as Hope should ever want to be around her. Girls like her are doomed to break hearts all their lives and maybe fall for one unattainable person, whereas girls like Hope get the epic love story and the epic love that they don't believe they deserve. Girls like her don't deserve girls like Hope.

And yet, she knows this will continue happening until someone inevitably gets hurt.

She also knows that it will most probably be her.

The air is heavy, full of tiny murmurs and sighs, and Lizzie cannot breathe but it's in the best possible way, it's because Hope has her mouth on her neck, biting and licking and her hands are sliding up under shirt, and her lungs burn, and so does her skin, where Hope's fingers and running higher and higher and…..

"Oh my God, my eyes!" comes a shriek, and they both jump a feet apart.

"What the," she starts, and sees who it is "Penelope! What the fuck are you doing here?"

"Um, I feel like I should be asking you that," she retorts, then turns an accusing finger towards Hope "And you, you didn't mention any of this when you were busy sighing over….."

"Park!" Hope warns her, and Penelope shuts up, abruptly, looking apologetic and shifty.

(Which, well. Fine, if Hope's too busy sighing over someone then who is she to care? If she's just here doing this to get over that someone then it's none of Lizzie's business)

(Except there's a hot, angry feeling in her chest that begs to differ)

"Just," Lizzie says, all of a sudden "Let's just leave. This is stupid."

"Lizzie," Hope puts her hand on her arm, and turns her until they're facing each other "Are you okay?"

There is genuine concern in her eyes, and Lizzie can't think at the moment, so she just shrugs.

"I cannot believe you're banging Hope!" Josie bursts into their room in the evening and stands in front of her, hands on her hips.

"And I cannot believe your girlfriend is this bad at keeping secrets," she replies, easily, closing the chemistry book she had been reading, and looking up at her twin.

Josie blushes for a moment "In her defense, the last time she tried keeping things from me it nearly destroyed our non-relationship."

Lizzie concedes her point with a tilt of her head.

"But forget that!" Josie suddenly remembers why she'd rushed in, and jumps back into it "What, and how and why are you canoodling with Hope?"

"First of all, there is no canoodling. At all. It was just a thing that started a while back."

"How while back?"

"Prom?" Lizzie tries weakly, and gets hit in the face with a pillow.

"This has been going on that long and you didn't tell me? Lizzie Saltzman! You….hussy."

"What?" she starts laughing, and Josie joins in after a minute. They collapse onto the bed, next to each other, still giggling. And then Lizzie tells her sister how it started, tells her the entire sordid tale. After the entire thing is done, Josie turns to her, and raises herself up on an elbow.

"Lizzie," she starts, but Lizzie cuts her off before she can go on.

"I know what you're going to ask."

Josie just waits, eyebrow raised.

"She doesn't…doesn't like me that way. It's probably just like benefits for her. Plus," she adds, trying to make her voice sound casual "I'm pretty sure she has the hots for someone else."

Josie looks like she want to say something, but she doesn't, after what seems like five minutes of a struggle.

"If you say so," she says finally, and leans down to rest her head against Lizzie's.

"Fuck!"

"Sorry, did I.."

"No, it's fine, just don't stop."

Lizzie doesn't want to stop. She keeps kissing Hope, keeps breathing in her kisses, keeps sucking along the edge of her jaw down to her neck. Hope is breathing so hard it sounds almost harsh in the complete silence of the dark room, but she's never heard anything sound sweeter.

"Hey," Hope suddenly pants out, and Lizzie stops, presses one last kiss to the column of her neck, and looks at her "You okay?"

Hope's eyes say things like _I care about you_, say that they're worried about whether she is okay, look sweet and concerned and filled with an emotion that Lizzie doesn't have the courage to decipher right now, so she breaks eye contact and leans forward to kiss her once, hard.

"Are you?" she mumbles against Hope's lips.

Hope turns her face so that they're looking at each other again, and her eyes are so soft that Lizzie wants to bury her face into her neck and stay here forever.

"I am."

This is bad. This is bad. This is bad.

Lizzie kisses her again, kisses her deeply, like she wants to drown in her, and decides that if this has to be the last time they're touching, she's going to make the most of it.

Hope finally gets her alone in the locker room, after the rest of the team is gone, and she's just picking up the last of her things.

"You're avoiding me," she tells Lizzie, arms crossed, waiting in front of the door.

Lizzie doesn't try denying it. She takes her time sorting through her clothes, arranging them in the locker, and slowly shutting it, then finally turns.

"I have," she says.

"I thought you'd at least have the decency to tell me that, face-to-face," Hope says, her voice clipped and angry "And fuck us, you know, whatever we were doing. You haven't even talked to me properly since a fucking week. I thought we were friends. We used to talk every day. And now you can't even look at me? Fuck you, Lizzie Saltzman."

"I can't do this," she manages, weakly.

"So we'll stop making out, Liz. Just don't stop being friends with me," Hope begs her, her voice almost desperate, and Lizzie has the sharp, sudden urge to cry.

"Is this because Penelope told you that I have feelings for you?" she continues, and goes on to say other things but Lizzie can't think beyond the I have feelings for you part, can't get over the voice saying it over and over again.

"You…..you what?"

"Oh, fuck," Hope whispers, hand to her forehead, her voice cracking, and Lizzie wants to stumble forward and hold her tight "You didn't know."

"You…..like me?" she asks, and her voice sounds completely incredulous, even to her.

Hope shrugs, her eyes watery, and Lizzie's head is a derailed train of thought right now.

She thinks _I did this to you_. Thinks _I don't want to, damn it, I'm pretty sure that I'm in love with you, that I can't stay away and this week has been the hardest week of my life_. Thinks _please, please, Hope, walk away, because I can't and I will ruin you. _Thinks_ Hope, Hope, Hope, Hope._

"This is a bad idea," she finds herself saying, in spite of every cell in her body revolting at the words.

"I'm sorry," Hope chokes out "Does this mean we can't be friends anymore, that you can't even look at me now?"

"Hope, please," Lizzie says, and it's a huge effort keeping her voice even "This is hard enough as it is."

(It is. It hurts so bad she wants to curl up into a ball and press a fist to her aching chest)

"Okay," Hope finally says, and her voice is angry again "Okay. I'm sorry I inconvenienced your life so much, Lizzie Saltzman. I won't be doing it again."

She watches Hope turn around, watches her slam the door shut, and walk away, and only after she is out of sight does she fall to her knees and fall apart.


	3. Chapter 3

To be very frank, Hope's entire High School Pool Party experience isn't going very well even before Lizzie arrives on the scene.

Hope wouldn't have been there, either, except she had been moping in her room since a week, listening to depressing, heartbreak music and Landon and M.G had finally dropped in, made her shower and change into something "hot and steaming and sexy" so they could go to some random jock's pool party, and forget all about girls.

So she had. She'd gotten out of bed, and changed into her best didn't-smell-like-gym dress, and driven to this place, only after she'd extracted a promise from both the boys that Lizzie wouldn't be there.

"I promise," Landon said, solemnly, hands on her shoulders "That the girl who's ridiculously in love with you but refuses to admit it, will definitely not be there."

"Landon," she sighed, weary "Don't….don't do that. It's not true, and it makes it hurt more."

"Hope," he'd replied "I've seen both of you around each other. It's pretty obvious to anyone with a pair of eyes and a working, functioning brain."

"Well then, you're looking at the wrong person, my man," M.G had chimed in from the backseat, and gotten a half-hearted fist to his chest.

Her working, functioning brain has completely given up on her, consumed with thoughts of one girl. Lizzie Saltzman, who she hadn't said one word to since that terrible day when they'd fought in the locker room and she had stormed off, runs through her mind all day, all night. Not even in her sleep does she let her be, coming in different variations of the same story, one that starts with them falling in love and ends with her walking away.

(Hope wakes up every night, with the saddest feeling in her chest, wakes up every night whispering the girl's name, wakes up every night wishing Lizzie was beside her)

And she misses her so much. Misses her laugh, misses the way they used to text each other random stuff till the late hours of the night before this entire stupid thing started. She misses the taste of her lips, misses the way Lizzie would melt into her arms as soon as she kissed the column of her neck. Misses her voice, or at least her voice directed at her. These days, it's all silent, awkward lunches with everyone talking too loudly at each other to cover for the ridiculously silence coming from two ends of the table. She's beginning to think she has a problem, what with the not being able to take her eyes off Lizzie in class, and constant opening Lizzie's text conversations, thinking of talking to her.

(There was one time, at two am, when she couldn't sleep and was staring at the chat when she saw the typing icon start up. She'd held her breath, willing the message to make its way through. After many attempts, it had stopped. That one minute still haunts her. Still makes her wonder what it could have been. _Stop staring at me like a weirdo_ was a worthy contender. _I'm glad you're out of my life_ was another. The one she kept hoping for, was the one that had the least possibility of happening. _I miss you. I fucked up, can we start over._

_I love you._)

"Okay, that's quite enough moping for today," Landon screams, right in her ear, over the mind-shattering loudness of some rock band blaring over the speakers.

"But this party sucks," she screams back "These drinks are trash, it smells like someone ate a jackfruit-chicken hybrid and then threw that up, and the songs are so shitty. I know you said that it would be nice for me to go places where Lizzie…."

It is at that exact moment that Lizzie walks in the door with Josie and Penelope, and makes eye-contact with her over the crowd, across the room, and Hope takes one terrible last sip of her red solo cup, and turns away.

"How long are you going to keep drinking in anger, and sitting silently?" Landon asks her, after she's finished with her God-knows-how-many_th_ cup of shitty alcohol and she shrugs.

"I'm afraid you're going to get alcohol poisoning," M.G tries, from her other side.

She doesn't feel drunk yet, but then that's always been her with drinks. All it does is make her brave, and take away her filter. And a little emotional. And this alcohol, shitty or not, is giving her head all kinds of thinks. Thoughts. Thoughts, damn it.

"But, but, do you see how beautiful she is?" she asks them. She knows what's happening, is completely in control, just misses Lizzie too much and is too lovesick to care "She is like the sun. With her blonde hair, and her straight perfect nose, and dude, she's like, so tall. Do you know how tall she is? Because it's a lot. It's so cute. She could trample me with her heels."

She sighs, then after a while, says again "I think I want her to trample me with her heels."

There's no response from either of the boys, so she frowns, confused, then looks to her left and right. They're missing. She's just about to jump to aliens when the last voice she expects to hear cuts into her head's rambling.

"They left me with you, like ten minutes ago?" Lizzie tells her.

"Oh, my God, you're here," she says, and her reaction seems slow, even to her "You weren't supposed to hear all that."

Lizzie leans down so they're eye-level, and Hope thinks she looks entirely too sad. Her eyes seem watery, and the corners of her mouth are turned down.

"Why are you so sad?" she asks her, touching her face "You shouldn't be sad. That's the last thing I want."

Lizzie closes her eyes, and chuckles, her voice breaking halfway. They stay like that for a moment, suspended in time, Hope with her hand on Lizzie's cheek, and the girl's eyes closed. Then Lizzie takes a deep breath, and picks her up bridal style. It takes a bit of maneuvering, but she manages it finally, and Hope feels herself sobering up every minute she's in her arms

"I'm going to take you home," Lizzie says, finally.

"My aunts are out," she tells Lizzie, slowly, her head almost completely sobered up, courtesy of the gallons of water she had just after they reached her house.

"Oh," Lizzie says, then resumes finding comfortable clothes for her with more abandon than before. She finally finds a t-shirt and shorts and brings them out to her "Here you go."

Hope just stares at her, the reality of the moment hitting both of them at the same time. It's like the entire week comes crashing into her in that one minute. She's pined away for this girl so much, has craved her presence, has cried over her more nights than she can count, and now they're both here, standing in front of each other.

She reaches forward at the same time Lizzie does, their lips meeting for one, perfect second before Lizzie pulls away, shaking her head.

"I can't," she whispers, her voice shaking. She sounds pained, and Hope doesn't know why "Hope, I can't."

"Please," she finds herself whispering back, kissing Lizzie's cheek, her forehead, the corner of her lips "Please, please, please."

Lizzie takes a deep breath that sounds more like a sob, and then gives in.

Hope will remember all of it the next morning. Will remember the way they almost tore the clothes off each other's bodies in their frenzy. Will remember the way Lizzie's touches and kisses turning bruising to tender eventually, how she hovered over her so gently, touched her all over with a care that almost brought Hope to tears. Will remember dragging Lizzie's hand down her body, only for her to stop and whisper against Hope's lips for her to stop.

"You've never," Lizzie told her, her face half-shadowed by the moon "Hope…"

Hope had kissed her fiercely "I want to."

"Baby, not like this," Lizzie had replied, a sad smile on her face, and then kissed her into distraction.

She would remember all of it, the way Lizzie collapsed against her after they were done kissing, the way she pressed the sweetest kiss onto her cheek. She'd remember pressing her forehead to Lizzie's both of them crying, although Hope couldn't figure out why. Most of all, she'd remember falling asleep with Lizzie tucked into her shoulder with an arm thrown against her waist.

So when she eventually wakes up alone, head aching, her misery has only her to blame.

"I'm fine, Landon," she hates talking on the phone while jogging, but the boy seems really worried and she might as well use up this time.

"Two weeks of both of you not acknowledging each other after the pool party is not fine," his voice sounds frustrated over the phone "It's stupid and immature."

"So it's basically us," she sighs "Look, I can't force her to do anything. She obviously doesn't have feelings for me, or anything that goes beyond sex and I….very obviously am in love with her. We're at an impasse. So I'm not going to confront her or whatever. I'd much rather wallow in my own heartbreak and sorrow in silence."

"You're being an idiot," he says, and then she notices her laces are undone. She leans down to tie them, and the next few minutes pass in a blur. She hears the screech of tyres, a voice screaming, and then sharp, shooting pain.

Just before she loses consciousness, the one thought she has is that she really, really hates talking on the phone while jogging.

Not-dying hurts like a bitch.

"You did not not-die, you asshole. It's just a fracture," Penelope tells her.

"I almost died," she retorts, looking around at all of them. Landon, M.G, Josie, Penelope and her aunt Freya "I was out for, what was it, days, right?"

"Half a day," M.G rolls his eyes, but she can see the naked concern in there.

She tries not to let her disappointment show, but her eyes cannot stop themselves from searching out Lizzie. For fuck's sake, she's just had a near-death experience. The least you could do for a not-fuck-buddy is show up when they break their arm and get a concussion along with it.

Apparently not.

"Was Lizzie here?" she asks her friends after her aunt walks out, in search of some food for her, after a million kisses on her forehead.

They all refuse to meet her eye.

"I want to sleep," she mutters, and does exactly that.

It's her aunt, apparently, who lets the metaphorical cat out of the bag, the third day she's in the hospital.

"Hey, why hasn't Lizzie come again?" she asks, in the middle of a very intense game of poker, and all of her friends groan, going shifty again.

"What do you mean, _again_? Hope asks "Guys?"

"I mean, she was here all throughout the time when," her aunt picks up only to be shot down by another cumulative sound by the group, and Hope asks her to get her a jello cup. After she's gone, she rises in the bed.

"Start. Explaining. Now."

"Okay fine," Penelope breaks "Lizzie was here. She just didn't want you to know."

"She was?" Hope asks again to confirm, the hope just shining in her words.

"Of course she was, Hope," Josie picks up "She's in love with you."

She's in love with you. She's in love with you. She's in love with you.

"I…..what?"

"She told us not to tell you anything," M.g says "But she was here the minute she found out. Didn't leave your bedside the entire time you were unconscious. Just sat here, face paler than yours, clutching onto your hand like it was the last life-raft of the freaking Titanic."

"Then why doesn't she want to be with me?"

"Because Lizzie Saltzman is a fucking idiot, in case you haven't noticed. Probably has some self-sacrificing bullshit to serve you. Who knows, right? The only thing that's clear to see on her face is that she loves you. Is ridiculously in love with you. Would die for you. Probably be a little less selfish and obnoxious or whatever…."

"Hey," she stops Penelope, the words slowly registering and bouncing around in her head "That's' my future girlfriend you're badmouthing."

She's in love with you, she thinks, and if there was ever a movie climax scene, this would probably be it. She starts getting up from the bed.

"Um, what exactly are you doing?" Landon asks her.

"Going to get my girl," she replies "I might need some help. Does anyone have a boombox?"


	4. Chapter 4

Lizzie's had so many moments of clarity these three months it's almost ridiculous how her life isn't at the climax scene of a Lifetime movie yet.

Moment of clarity #1:

Walking down the stairs and seeing Hope looking up at her like she had a halo hanging over her head.

Moment of clarity #2:

Kissing Hope in the girl's bathroom accidently. Feeling her heart run overtime for about a minute and then feeling it stop entirely.

Moment of clarity #3:

Watching Penelope and Josie in each other's arms after Prom. Realizing exactly how much damage she had wrought by just being completely blind, selfish and self-obsessed, and feeling a strange mixture of guilt and happiness. _I want that_, she'd thought, and on the heels of that thought had come another one, _I don't deserve that_. She'd looked at Hope smiling at the both of them, and promised herself that she'd stay away.

Moment of clarity #4:

Kissing Hope in a broom closet. The realization that she was pretty crap at staying away.

Moment of clarity #lost count:

Feeling Hope tremble and shudder in her arms, her skin shining in the moonlight, vulnerable, and glowing. Thinking _You are so beautiful_, feeling it on the tip of her tongue, and swallowing it down with kisses. Thinking _Hope, Hope, Hope I love you so much_. Thinking _I'm sorry I couldn't stay away_. Thinking _This love is going to be the death of me_.

"You're crying," she'd said, lying face-to-face with Hope.

"So are you," Hope had whispered back, ducking down to kiss at her chin, and Lizzie had blinked in surprise, wiping at her eyes "Why are you crying?"

She'd shrugged, feeling the sudden urge to press her face to Hope's chest and stay there forever. Then she had put her palm over Hope's eyes.

"Sleep," she'd said.

"Don't leave," the girl had mumbled, and she had just kissed her forehead in reply.

Leaving Hope is the hardest thing she's ever had to do.

Moment of clarity #lost count +1

"Where is she?"

"Lizzie, calm down," Landon told her, over the phone.

"Mophead, I'm only going to ask you once more. Where. Is. Hope."

"They rushed her to the hospital. Penelope will be picking both you and Josie up in five minutes."

Her heart refused to calm down, even after they had reached the hospital. She was pacing in the corridor, fiddling with her phone, tapping her right hand to the side of her thigh, and could feel Josie's eyes on her at all times, concerned and caring.

"Saltzman?" Penelope asked her, tentatively, handing her a cup of coffee "You want to maybe sit down?"

"I can't," she replied, tightly wound "This is all that is holding me together right now, Park, I can't, I can't, I can't relax, I'm going to….."

"I know," Penelope nodded, hands on her shoulders, glancing at Josie "I'd feel the same way."

Finally being allowed to see a sleeping Hope. Remembering the way she'd rushed over to her, grabbing her uninjured hand, and kissing it over and over again, murmuring things she was too embarrassed to repeat, not caring about who was watching. Only leaving when the doctor had come in to tell them that Hope was going to be waking up soon.

"Don't tell her I was here," she'd told them, right before she had left, and when all of them had looked up at her, completely in disbelief, continued "Please. I'm begging you."

"This is getting stupid, Lizzie," Josie argued "You love her and she loves you. I don't get what the big deal is, let us…."

"No, please, Josie, I love you, but please, as your sister, this is one thing I'm asking of you. Just, do me this favor. Don't."

And then she'd walked away. Turned out she was getting pretty good at that.

Alaric enters her room, about ten seconds after the song hits her ears.

She has been crashing in her bed right after she gets back from school since the past three days. Hope's doing a lot better, from what Josie tells her regularly (sometimes in the middle of making out with Penelope, sometimes in the middle of heated discussions with her over what is cuter, a dog in a wig, or a baby in a trash bag. Lizzie personally thinks the baby in a trash bag sounds cuter. She also thinks that Hope would argue it's the former, and hates herself for imagining how absolutely adorable Hope would look arguing her point). Today as well, she's just lying in bed fiddling with her fidget spinner when she hears the music.

_Woke up in a pool of sweat, at first I thought that I pissed the bed_

She frowns, and is just about to get up, when her father rushes in.

"Lizzie, why is Hope Mikaelson standing in front of our house, blasting some Godawful rock song in our yard?"

_And I went down, like the speed of sound_

_You're out of sight, but not out of mind_

Her first instinct is to freak because "How the fuck did they let her out of the hospital?"

"Language," he admonishes, then breaks into an excited grin "I approve, by the way. Nice girl. Amazing girl. In fact, may I just say…."

"Yes, yes, we know you love her, dad, the entire school knows," she mumbles, distractedly, walking over to the window, head in a whirl. She honestly has no idea what's happening right now. There are a lot of things going on.

_I had a dream that I kissed your lips, and it felt, so true_

She walks out onto the balcony to see the idiot, standing there with a walker, hand in a sling, head bandages not even out yet, holding up a boombox balanced precariously on top of the walker. Her friends are all squeezed in Penelope's car, watching from a distance.

_Then I woke up as a nervous wreck, and I fell for you_

"Hey, Lizzie," Hope calls out, smiling at her, and she. Well. She kind of melts into a puddle in her own balcony.

"Are you pulling a Say Anything on me?" she asks, because she doesn't know what to say. Actually, scratch that. She knows exactly what to say. Just doesn't trust herself right now.

_I'll spend the night living in denial, making paper planes just for a while_

_I'll crash into you, crash into you, if you crash in my imagination too_

"I took some time deciding between Green Day and Baby Shark, but I feel like this was the better option," Hope replies, still smiling that goddamn smile of hers.

She can't help it, she smiles back. And that's the moment she knows she's lost.

"I'm going to come downstairs, okay?" she says.

"I'll wait," Hope promises her, solemnly.

"Do you want to sit down?" she asks Hope, who's showing signs of weariness.

"No."

"Please?"

The speed with which Hope nods her yes has her smiling once more, as she gently takes her hands and helps her sit on the grass. Touching her after so long feels like a drug, and Lizzie is afraid she might never let go. Hope solves the problem for her by intertwining their fingers, and Lizzie can't stop smiling.

"I take it the grand gesture wasn't completely unwelcome?" Hope asks her, suddenly shy.

"It wasn't."

"Good," she clears her throat once, twice "Because, you know I'm all about not creeping people out by going too big or whatever…."

"Hope, it's okay. I," she starts, and then fumbles because there are so many things to say, so many things to apologize for "I, I fucked up. I fucked up so bad. God, if you knew how shitty I feel…"

Hope waits it out, looking at her patiently.

"I'm pretty sure I've spent half of my life being ridiculously in love with you," Lizzie continues "I mean, how could I not? You're…you're Hope. You're beautiful, and you're badass, and you make the cutest face when you see a dog, and you go aw at stupid things and you do this thing to my heart where it goes kaboom every time you so much as smile at me, and. Yeah, you're the best person in the entire world, almost up there with Josie. And I'm…..me. I'm selfish, vapid, self-obsessed. In what world could you justifiably like me back?"

Hope raises their hands to kiss the back of Lizzie's once, twice, thrice, then speaks "The first time I ever felt scared of anyone, it was Freshman year, just before Spring Break, and you'd kicked a jock in the nads because he kept calling Josie "The uglier Twin". I mean, it was right before Penelope fucked up his life by planting that itching powder in his shorts, but I've never felt more scared of anyone in my life. Turned on, too."

She looks up, surprised Hope remembers this, but the girl continues.

"And later when I finally got the courage to say to hi when I saw you bunking class on the rooftops, you offered me your right earphone and we sat in silence for an hour listening to Taylor Swift. The next day, we listened to Green Day, After that, Haken. Next week, we were talking about whether weed was a better high than Whiskey. You thought it was whiskey. I disagreed. I thought it was you. I've always thought you were the biggest high of them all."

"Hope," she cuts in, her voice shaking "I'm not good for you. I'm an asshole. For fuck's sake, you know how I used to treat Josie before, you know how judgmental I am, how stupidly opinionated, and I'm a bitch and I cut people down and….."

"I love you."

"Hope."

"I love you," Hope goes on, steadily "I love you. I love that you're a bitch. I like that you're judgmental, your first opinions on people make me laugh. And your opinions on most things are hilarious, so that's not really a problem for me."

"I'm going to hurt you," she says, and it's all she has left.

"This is hurting me," Hope replies, and she hears the vulnerability in her voice "This is already hurting both of us. Staying away from each other doesn't help. I can't stay away. I can't bear not being with you, okay? You're the best thing that could've happened to me, in spite of what you think about yourself. I love you, bitchiness and all. I just…..I just want you. That's all I've ever wanted. I don't even care what we call it. I just want to be yours. Because I already am."

A tear escapes, in spite of her best attempts to stop it, and she leans forward to rest her forehead against Hope's, all the fight rushing out of her in one tiny whoosh. She's too tired to fight herself anymore, too tired to stay away.

"I'm yours," she says, softly, and feels more than sees Hope smile, bright and wide. Hope reaches up to kiss her forehead, then kisses both her cheeks, and ends up with their mouths nearly touching.

"Is it okay if I…."

She doesn't let Hope finish. Lizzie presses her lips to hers, and feels lights bursting behind her eyelids, feel the odd mixture of relief, and joy Hope's presence has always brought her, feels her heart going kaboom in her chest, feels the butterflies dancing the tango in her stomach. She kisses her, and like a drug, never wants this to stop. She wants to kiss her, and keep kissing her until the end of time, even with all her friends hooting loudly and honking the car horn repeatedly.

"We've got idiots for friends," Hope says after they draw apart to take a breath.

She shrugs "I'm too happy to care right now."

The girl of her dreams smiles at her, and yeah, this is the Lifetime ending she's been waiting for her entire life.


End file.
